Say you're the average Ferrari F430 owner. Whether inspired by your conscience or an environmentally conscious mistress, you feel a sudden need to show your support for planet-saving consumerism. What do you do? Follow the advice of MSN Cars Green Motoring and trade that Italian eco-disaster for a Porsche 911. Citing its fuel economy and relatively low CO2 emissions, they compare the Porker to a number of exotics and declare it good. And if the base 911 isn't fast enough, they point out that the 911 Turbo pollutes less than your average F430, R8 or Gallardo and gets better mileage than any of them. Who needs a Prius when you can save the planet in a Porsche?

The Daily Mail reports that London's Congestion Charge (CC) is quickly morphing into a pollution tax. Mayor "Red" Ken Livingston is set to modify The City's congestion fees, levying up to £6,500 a year on drivers living within the charging zone who helm larger (i.e. more CO2-emitting) vehicles. Visitors to central London piloting SUVs, minivans or full-size luxury cars will be hit with a £25 a day fee. Mr. Livingston, a man known to keep taxis waiting for hours at taxpayer's expense, has little sympathy for people who "can afford to choose from pretty much the whole of the mainstream car market but have chosen to buy one of the most polluting vehicles." More surprisingly, The Mail says that after a 33 percent decline in traffic levels, the congestion charge now only accounts for eight percent traffic reduction compared to pre-CC levels.

Davisenterprise.com is reporting a strange (if entirely theoretical) wrinkle in the potential for plug-in electric hybrids: power generation. Pacific Gas & Electric Co. is "readying a program" whereby the utility company could draw power from plug-in hybrids plugged into the power grid. The first suggestion: if the cars were equipped with solar panels they could sell power back to the power company. OK, right, second idea: tap into the connected cars to smooth-out power generation during spikes in demand. Kyle Aarons, project manager in PG&E's Clean Air Transportation Department (doesn't it do that by itself?) explains: "Let's say a bunch of people switch on their lights all at once and so demand for electricity spikes up in a very short amount of time. Instead of having one of our power plants ramp up a little bit or opening the gate a little bit more on a dam, we can maybe use energy from (the cars') batteries to just, sort of, meet that little spike and then allow our power plants to ramp up more evenly, and it's more cost-effective when we do it that way.” Aarons promises that the electric company would put the power back, and admits this system "likely wouldn't be available for several years." 

House politicians burning the midnight oil have passed a $16b bill designed to reduce our dependence on imported energy. While the bill must be reconciled with the Senate version and the President is already threatening a veto (as expected), its provisions clearly indicate which way the wind [farm] is blowing. The San Francisco Chronicle reports that the bill repeals tax breaks to the oil and gas industry, to the tune of $16b. On the automotive front, it provides $4k tax breaks for hybrid and plug-in hybrid cars, hands out loan guarantees and "other assistance" for advanced diesel and hybrid battery technology, and mandates $3.5b in tax credits for E-85 pump installation. The hotly-debated proposal to raise the federal Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards didn't get a look in. The champion of the hike, Massachusetts Democrat Representative Edward Markey, put his hands in the air like he just didn't care. "This is the historic break with the fossil-fuel past and the beginning of the solar-wind renewable era in the United States," the chairman of the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming told The Boston Globe. "People will look back at this as the turning point where Congress began to embrace renewable energy." 

Any blog post that starts off "With apologies for my carbon footprint" isn't about to describe the virtues of Drive-In movies. The PC mea culpa comes from Ethan Kent, the comely Veep of Project for NYC-based Project for Public Spaces (PPS), a nonprofit organization with a not-so-hidden agenda: "If you plan cities for cars and traffic, you get cars and traffic. If you plan for people and places, you get people and places." Kent's just returned from Melbourne, Australia and he likes what he sees. For example, the city is taxing long term parking spaces AU $400 per year (rising to AU $800 next year). Melbourne City Council will receive AU $5 million a year from the AU $19m to AU $38.5m to fund urban and transport improvements. Kent pronounces Melbourne's automotive purge an excellent starting point for his kind of urban planning: "At first glance, one might assume that the successful revitalization of Melbourne's downtown was the result of the city's efforts to drive automobiles out of the central business district. But traffic reduction was only one piece of the puzzle. Melbourne's renaissance was accomplished by focusing on the improvement, democratization and vitality of the city's public spaces."

The Automotive X PRIZE (AXP) challenge is offering a multi-million dollars prize to anyone who can build a marketable car capable of 100 mpg or more. There's only one catch: the X PRIZE Foundation doesn't have the prize money, yet. The Foundation is a self-described "educational nonprofit prize institute whose mission is to create radical breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity." They're trying to raise prize funds by "seeking assistance from major foundations, corporations and philanthropic individuals to help bring about this revolution in transportation." So far, 30 teams from the US, Canada, and Europe have signed up for the challenge. The major automakers are conspicuous in their absence, but if they could come up with 100-mpg technology they'd be patenting it and turning huge profits from selling ultra-economy vehicles.

Ford's Twin Cities production plant in Highland Park, Minnesota– one of three that build the Ford Ranger pickup– is slated for closure in 2008. FoMoCo's been looking to sell the 138-acre parcel to local property developers. The site, which still has tunnels where the company mined sandstone to make glass windshields, occupies one of St. Paul's nicer neighborhoods. Only The Minneapolis St.Paul Star Tribune reports that the site is awash with toxins: waste oil and solvents, paint sludges, batteries, gasoline and diesel. There are over 40 identified "hot spots" and the groundwater ain't too healthy neither. Stefanie Denby, communications and marketing director for Ford Land, promised a thorough clean-up: "We take our environmental responsibility very seriously." Given the enormous cost and effort required to "remediate" large, heavily polluted sites, the company's seriousness could push the land deal from the profit to the liability side of Ford's ledger. 

Just as anything Apple now gets an "i" prefix and any traditional industry moving its products or services online feels compelled to stick an "e" in front of it (e.g. eLoan), anything hydrogen-related gets a "hy" five. I'm speaking here of HyHauler™ and HyHauler Plus™. The first is Quantum Technologies' portable hydrogen filling station, while the second is a mobile filling station PLUS an on-board hydrogen generator! Now how much would you pay? Just-Auto reports that GM has purchased three hytankers at an undisclosed price. The rolling Hindenbergs filling stations will support GM's hydrogen fuel cell-powered hyhypemobiles at "various locations from vehicle proving grounds and public ride-and-drive events to fleet demonstrations." Quantum's website is strangely silent about cost, safety and the energy needed to create and pump the hydrogen into zero emissions vehicles.

How does 0 – 60 in less than a second, and 156 mph in the quarter mile sound? Like… a loud whir. MSNBC reports Scott Dube's lithium-ion powered KillaCycle is breaking local records at drag strips and hopes to challenge the world record for bikes powered by nitromethane. That's not too bad for "a giant cordless drill with wheels." In the four-wheeled world, Dick Brown's White Zombie started life as a 1972 Datsun 1200. The undead automobile is now the world's quickest-accelerating street-legal electric car, covering the quarter mile in 11.46 seconds (the Corvette Z06 needs 11.8 seconds to cover the same distance). In terms of consumer aplications, the Zombie's quarter-mile driving range could be something of an issue.

We repeat: the Toyota Prius is the official car of the intellectually superior. According to InsideBayArea.com, after trailing Camry, Corolla, Accord, and Civic in Santa Clara County in California's Silicon Valley last year, Prius has outsold all four through May of this year. Ron Diridon, executive director of the Mineta Transportation Institute at San Jose State University and himself a Prius militant owner, shows no lack of hubris in his assessment of the situation: "The intellectual capacity within Silicon Valley is amazing. That higher level of education reflects a higher level of understanding of the terrible consequences of global warming." Intellectual superiority aside, the free pass to the carpool lane that was available for Prius drivers, the outrageous price of gas in California and the fact you can now buy a Prius for less than sticker had a bit to do with it as well.

Ford's soy foam seat cushions are so not enough. Reliable Plant magazine reports that students at the University of Warwick in Coventry, UK, have built a car using botanical materials for almost everything save the frame and engine. The open-wheel single-passenger car features a body made from hemp, tires that started life on a potato farm and brake pads that once grew on a cashew tree. Suitably-named project manager Ben Wood claims he can get the car up to 150 mph "given a long straight and a tailwind." Wood hopes to design a race car that is "95 percent biodegradable or recyclable." If these products carry over into passenger car design, will the manufacturers offer a 100K mile warranty against termite damage?

`If we have the worst case coming out of Washington, all bets are off. We don't know how to get there without spending $6,000 or $7,000 per car.'' In his battle to kneecap the Senate bill designed to raise federal corporate average fuel economy standards, GM's Car Czar has added $4k to $5k per car to his original estimate of the legislation's impact on GM's costs. Lutz' numbers reflect a new, theoretical strategy for meeting the new, theoretical legislation: an all-hybrid lineup. Lutz told Bloomberg that GM's current hybrid system costs about $10k per vehicle. If used on all cars and trucks, the cost would fall to $6k to $7k. Alternatively, nothing. And what about the four percent per year mandate after the new standards are met? Lawmakers might as well mandate that cars "float four inches off the ground." Huh?

Reuters reports that three Welsh fishing buddies claim they've invented a device that collects 85 percent of CO2 produced by any internal combustion engine. More importantly, their "green box" holds the gas in a safe, inert state that can be easily handled, transported and released into a controlled environment. The inventors theorize that algae could then feast on the collected CO2, after which the algae could become biodiesel. If the technology works as advertised, the system would make a nice little end run around the whole greenhouse gas issue. Skeptics should note that not even the inventors wives have examined the green box's innards. Also, after every demonstration organic chemist Derek Palmer and engineers Ian Houston and John Jones divide their invention into three parts and hide them in various locations across North Wales. Should we buy this fabulous claim? Maybe. After all, Welshman William Robert Grove invented the first fuel cell– in the 1800's.  

Congestion charging (CC) proponents often justify the regressive tax by citing the need to reduce vehicular pollution in city centers. In their campaign to stymie a local CC scheme, Manchester Against Road Tolls (MART) points out that the Manchester City Council's plan singularly fails to tackle the real cause of the city's air pollution: buses. "Buses and indeed any vehicle with a large diesel power unit that repeatedly puts the engine under load – like pulling away from bus stops – emit the two most carcinogenic chemicals known to science, labelled 3-NBA and 1,8-DNP," MART's press release opined. "Buses are also heavy emitters of nitrogen dioxide and general particulates, both of which are respiratory irritants." It does seem odd that Manchester hasn't retired its smoke-belching buses. The city has one of Europe's busiest bus routes (Oxford Road/Wilmslow Road). It was also the first municipalities to introduce the diesel – electric Econo Optare Solo hybrid bus.

Like most other states, Connecticut has been buying flex-fuel vehicles to comply with the Energy Policy Act of 1992 (EPAct), which requires that 75 percent of new vehicles purchased by the states be capable of running on alternative fuel. According to The Hartford Courant, 1700 of the state’s 4299 vehicles are now flex-fuel compatible. But there’s a snag. There are only two E85 pumps in the entire state. Little wonder that a study released earlier this week by Connecticut Governor M. Jodi Rell found that the state's flex-fuel vehicles use ethanol only three percent of the time. Given the cost-benefit ratios involved, I can’t help thinking ethanol is a solution looking for a problem.